The 404 1,074: Where it's not you, it's us (podcast)

Leaked from today's 404: The irreparable MacBook Pro with Retina Display, Reddit bans high-end domains for astroturfing, 3D-printing a burrito, and a company taxing users for browsing with Internet Explorer 7!

The new Apple MacBook Pro with Retina Display announced earlier this week just got an Editors' Choice review on CNET, but some die-hard tinkerers are upset about the lack of upgradeable components inside. According to iFixit.org, the latest MacBook Pro is the least reparable Apple laptop to date.

For starters, users are locked into the amount of RAM they choose at the purchase date, as the memory is actually soldered to the logic board. The proprietary solid-state hard drive is staying put as well, and watch out for a couple of booby traps concealed underneath the lithium-polymer battery! The laptop certainly remains incomparable in terms of display, I/O ports, and chassis, but keep in mind that your upgrade options down the line are severely limited if you go with this model.

Reddit's under the spotlight again for banning a long list of domains from getting links on the community site. The list is incomplete for now, but we do know that BusinessWeek.com, Phys.org, ScienceDaily.com, and The Atlantic are all facing bans to limit astroturfing and gamification.

The accusations aren't exactly unfounded, either. Earlier this year, Reddit slammed a ban down on The Atlantic's social media editor when users started noticing an outpouring of links from an account that all led back to Atlantic Web sites. A quick search of the offender's Reddit handle on Google unearthed an OKCupid profile with the same name that also featured an undeniable picture of the editor in question, which resulted in his ban. Though Reddit's rules for posting one's own content for upvotes is a little nebulous, this is clearly a case of the site's more concerted effort to preserve its purity.

In more exciting news, now you can 3D print your own burrito! Well, kind of. The BurritoB0t project is self-professed foodie Marko Manriquez's senior thesis at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications program. You may have thought that something called a "BurritoB0t" would actually output a real, edible burrito layer by layer, but it's not quite there yet. Instead, Marko used a Makerbot 3D printer and the Reprap.org community to come up with a machine that houses nozzles for various burrito condiments.

Using a Web app interface or an iPhone app, Manriquez gives users the power to select exactly how much of each ingredient they want inside, but the process still requires a burrito artist to put it all together. Someday we're hoping to have a similar machine that can do it all, not unlike this scene in "The Fifth Element."

About the author

Justin Yu covers headphones and peripherals for CNET. When he's not wading through Web gulch or challenging colleagues to typing tests, you can find him making fun of technology with Jeff Bakalar every afternoon on The 404 show.
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